Fragmented Thoughts & Morbid Realities
by Vizaryll
Summary: Waking up in dense forest, with no memory of their previous life, a young soul struggles to remember their identity, and purpose, as they travel through the dense undergrowth of a quartz crystal wasteland. OC-focused, Hollow-centric story.
1. Of Monsters & Men

An eerie wind echoed through the dense, dark forest. The spots of light that trickled down from the upper canopy were inconsistent, and uncommon. Every now and then, a distant howl could be heard on the wind.

A soft grunt was heard, as a white demon awoke unexpectedly from its slumber.

_"Where am I?"_

No answer came.

Slowly, it opened its eyes, and the creature raised its head from the hard, stone ground. Shock flooded its system.

It was in a new, not very well lit, location. A small clearing, surrounded by a dense, dim forest of white-grey trees, that appeared to be made from stone, and had no leaves. Looking up, visibility lasted a few feet at most, before light gave way to the dark upper canopy of the forest.

In addition, its body was different. The creature didn't know why, but it knew it wasn't supposed to look like this. It couldn't quite remember what it was supposed to look like, but it definitely wasn't this.

Fortunately, panic hadn't yet set in. Merely shock.

The creature slowly got to its feet and took inventory. It wore no clothes. The entire skin seemed entirely black. It could feel a thick, leathery-feeling skin, as it traced its own limbs with its fingers.

Some patches of skin felt smooth, while others felt rough, and hard. It seemed that the outer forearms, front side of the lower legs, and knuckles all had hard, rough patches of thick skin, and hard, packed muscle underneath. While other areas of the body had less muscle, and softer skin.

Out of the corner of its vision, it could see a white blur. Likely something on its own face.

Most surprising was the tail that seemed to exist behind it. It definitely felt new, like it didn't belong. But the creature had full control of the tail, instinctively.

With the gut-wrenching sound of tearing flesh, a set of claws ripped their way out of the creature's fingers, where it expected something else to be. The skin appeared to heal rapidly, however.

Standing up felt unsteady, so the creature dropped back down to all four limbs and found greater balance. Taking a few experimental steps forward, the creature slowly became more satisfied and confident with its new existence.

Attempting to open its mouth and call out a cry for help, however, was futile. It could speak no words, struggling to do anything other than cry out an unintelligible call for help, into the dark trees surrounding it.

Taking a moment, the creature sat down, as a feeling of hopelessness welled up inside it.

One minute, two minutes, three... They seemed to stretch into eternity.

Until finally, _something_ answered.

A roar echoed back towards the creature. A loud roar, that sounded close-by, near the clearing that the creature found itself in.

The snapping of stone twigs preceded the arrival of the newcomer. The creature watched as another, slowly and cautiously, lumbered its way into the clearing.

It looked like the creature expected itself to look. A tall, dark body, but surprisingly a large, white mask sat atop its face. The mask appeared to cover halfway around the head, before completely disappearing. A terrifying face could be seen on the mask itself, complete with red, beady eyes, that seemed to penetrate its very soul.

The creature roared out a questioning roar and found itself unsurprised when the newcomer failed to respond.

What did surprise it moments later, however, was the much louder roar that came in return. That roar was followed by a step forward, and a lower, more threatening sounding growl.

The creature backed up, as the newcomer advanced, until it fell a tree behind it. The moment the creature stopped retreating, the demon _pounced_.

Moving forwards at a startling pace, the creature could only raise its arms in a pitiful defence as the other scored a direct hit. The creature roared in pain as the other's claws raked across its arms. Dark red, almost black, blood splashed in both their faces, as the demon pushed the creature to the ground, using its body weight to overwhelm and smother the creature.

The demon opened its mouth, and the creature saw a set of razor-sharp teeth, in the now gaping maw of its enemy, which stretched across its face into an obscene grin.

Panic had fully set in, and a surge of unknown energy and will energised the creature, powering its limbs and forcing the demon off it, with a mighty heave.

A red haze settled over the creature, although whether it was from the blood from its wound, or an emotional state of mind for battle, it couldn't decide.

With the same energy from unknown origins, the creature leapt towards the stunned enemy, which had landed on its back a few scant feet away, due to the creature's counter-attack.

Landing on top, the creature wasted no time in getting busy. Using its new claws, it attacked the soft underbelly of the demon, drawing out a cry of pain from its opponent.

Pressing its advantage, the creature wrapped its long, spikey tail around its enemy's left wrist, sinking the spikes into the tough flesh of the opponent, while restraining the other wrist with its left hand. This left the creature with a hand free to attack with, while its opponent was powerless to resist.

Pausing for a moment, the creature roared out a question, laden with confusion, and righteous outrage. Why had it been attacked by the demon? What were they? Why were they here? What was going on?!

Unfortunately, the demon had no reply, as it simply continued to struggle for its life.

A punch, powered by righteous fury and indignation, landed on the demon's mask, damaging it massively. A large splinter cracked across the mask, as if like glass.

Suddenly, a powerful, instinctual urge overcame the creature, as it lowered its head towards the neck of the now frantically squirming, badly damaged demon.

Using its free hand, the creature wrenched the demon's head upwards, with a satisfying crack. Now free to continue its attack, the creature lowered its mouth towards the demon's unprotected neck. The demon's cries for help became more and more frantic, until they finally ceased. The creature had torn out its throat. Dark lifeblood spurted everywhere, drenching both creatures in its warmth.

The creatures tail unwrapped from the no longer struggling arm, and it took a step to the side, away from the now still body of its adversary. The powerful urge to consume was still there, so it lowered its head and began to drink the warm blood from its opponent's body.

Without warning, the demon's body flashed brightly, and seemed to dissolve into bright blue, scattered particles. The creature instinctively knew how to gorge on the particles and sucked them into its mouth.

After a moment, the last of the lights had been devoured, and only the original creature remained in the clearing. It felt different though. Many thoughts ran through its head, but one prevailed.

_"I feel stronger now."_

* * *

A few minutes later, boredom and confusion had once again begun to set in. Deciding to leave the clearing, the creature walked towards where the demon had appeared from.

While walking, the creature turned its thoughts inwards, as it discovered some new bits of knowledge and insight it hadn't previously known. It seems that devouring the demon from earlier had unlocked some kind of hidden thoughts inside the creatures head.

Unfortunately, this knowledge was fragmented, scattered throughout blocked off memories, hidden from the active mind of the creature.

One thought seemed consistent, however. One word echoed through the creature's mind. A single word, drifting, as if on a non-existent wind.

_Amari_.


	2. Understanding the Beast Within

Amari, as the creature now referred to itself, had discovered a small hill, with an opening at its base.

At first, the Hollow was wary. The opening was barely big enough to fit into, and the inside was dark. But no sounds could be heard from inside.

Cautiously, Amari approached the cave. Managing to squeeze through the entrance, Amari found itself in an unnatural abode. Someone, or something, had lived here recently. There was hay on the floor, clearly a makeshift bed, as well as other miscellaneous items scattered around.

One of the items quickly caught Amari's interest; A book.

Opening the book, revealed it to be a journal. The journal of a person called Ashido Kanō.

The journal was a treasure-trove of information for Amari. It spoke of a Hueco Mundo, the name of the world it had awoken to. As well as a Forest of Menos, or Menos Forest, apparently the name of the quartz-crystal place which surrounded Amari. This indicated that there was something beyond the dark, desolate wasteland. Or, at least, that's what Amari hoped.

Amari also discovered it was something called a Hollow. Amari's memories were hazy, and they were unable to remember anything about themselves, beyond their name. Age, gender, race, or species even.

It seemed Ashido was a Shinigami, _whatever that was, _documenting notes as a report, for something called the Soul Society.

Deciding to leave, rather than face the anger of whatever lived here, Amari squeezed back through the opening and exited the cave.

* * *

Over the coming weeks, Amari would be attacked by many Hollows wandering through the bleak forest. Sometimes, recently, Amari would be the aggressor. Ashido's notes had stated that Hollows had a power-based hierarchical system built into their very nature. Only the strongest would survive, and the only way to get strong was to kill the weak.

For some reason, that didn't resonate too well with Amari, but Amari soon got over the idea of their own morals after the hundredth time of being attacked, and soon became the aggressor, rather than being aggressed upon.

The weaker Hollows were easy to spot. Lumbering beasts, wandering aimlessly, without purpose. It was almost sad, the way some of them died. Crying out in pain, but with no will to fight back.

Amari soon learned to avoid the Hollows that could speak. Most Hollows couldn't speak, but Amari soon realised the ability to form words indicated experience and strength of its own kind. After all, Amari couldn't yet speak, and was only seemingly able to verbalise oddly-low, growly, rumbling sounds.

It was a lonely existence, and Amari often found itself wondering what the point of continuing on was. It quickly remembered the weaker Hollows it had devoured previously, which helped remind Amari why exactly to continue.

Eventually, after many months of endless hunting and being hunted, Amari finally came across something different.

A large gash in mid-air, split open the repetitive forest. It was only a few feet wide, and not all that tall. But it was different, and that was enough to peak Amari's curiosity.

Without much caution, Amari strode towards the tear in reality. Fortunately, no other Hollows were around to capitalise on the brief lapse in judgement from Amari, and attack during the distraction.

Placing its hand before the gap, Amari could only see darkness. Pushing through, the tear seemed to warp around it, pulsing as it did so. Using its not-so-insignificant strength, Amari began stretching the hole downwards, in order to fit its body through.

Pressing on through the gap, Amari forced its form forward. Not knowing what was going to happen, but ecstatic to be free of the boredom that had overcome it.

Once beyond, Amari's world turned dark as the gap closed suddenly, and Amari began falling.

In a panic, Amari did the one thing that came naturally. Expanding its power, Amari roared into the abyss.

Slowly, the falling began to halt, as Amari discovered tiny particles of… Something, began to form at its feat. Amari belatedly remembered reading about Reishi in Ashido's notes.

The Reishi at Amari's feet continued to coalesce, allowing further progression into the dark world.

A literal light at the end of the tunnel finally showed Amari an end to the interesting journey.

Out of the dark space, and into a blinding light temporarily stunned Amari. Looking around at the unfamiliar world, Amari attempted to gauge where exactly the schism had opened up to.

Amari's keen eyes tracked movement to the right, and Amari watched as 2 humans moved down an old dirt road. Amari realised quickly they were humans, one older male, and a slightly younger female.

Various memories flooded Amari, many of them from a male perspective, where he was tall, strong, towering over others, and asserting his presence. Other memories came, few and far between, but from a different perspective. She was young, weaker, but still feisty. Shouting at the unfair, unjust world.

Seeing these humans angered Amari. These memories were confusing, and definitely unwanted. The urge to strike, and remove the offending memories flooded the Hollow's body.

Faster than the pair of humans could ever hope to move, Amari struck. Slashing at the back of the male, Amari wasted no time in pouncing on the woman. Revelling in her shrill screams, Amari viciously tore into her side.

Sensing the male attempting to stand, Amari used its tail to strike the man. The tip of the tail shot straight through the man's throat, and pinned him to the ground. Amari watched in satisfaction as the man's lifeblood drained into the ground.

Going back to the woman beneath it, Amari's mouth bore down on her neck, ripping into it with sharp teeth. A soft, gurgling sound could be heard, as the woman helplessly flailed around under her invisible assailant.

Satisfied with the quick and easy kills, Amari absorbed their essences, before deciding to move on.

Over the next few hours, Amari systematically hunted down hundreds of humans, easily ripping through their soft flesh and weak bones. Crushing body and spirit alike. Occasionally, the Hollow ran into a recently deceased human. Their spirits were absorbed just as quickly as the fresh ones Amari killed.

Some humans tasted better than others, and Amari discovered that the ones that could see their otherworldly attacker gave more essence than the humans that couldn't. After that, Amari purposefully revealed himself to larger groups, and chased the ones that reacted to the Hollow's presence.

Unfortunately for Amari, the killing streak ended abruptly, and it was the Hollow's latest tactic that gave the game away.

Men and women clad in black, chased Amari with swords. Every time Amari thought it had successfully escaped, they turned up a second later. Silent like the wind, and faces grimmer than death, they chased Amari across miles of forest, and down old, dirt paths.

In sheer desperation, the Hollow had managed to call upon the rift in space that had originally been the gateway to this world.

Stepping through the portal, elation filled the Hollow's body. It had done it. It had escaped.

Turning around, Amari heard the curses of the pursuing shadows that had been chasing the Hollow for hours. Grinning back at them, Amari turned, and trotted towards Hueco Mundo; a spring in its step.


End file.
